Right around now, the Destiny hype is shifting into high gear. On September 6, Bungie is dropping the sequel to Destiny. Although it has been almost a year since the last expansion was released for Destiny, the impending release of Destiny 2 has got me personally psyched and convinced that Destiny is about to become a sensation again. The new sleeker look of Destiny 2 along with its promise of being much more story driven and immersive could quite possibly make it even bigger than the first installment of the franchise.
Every game has their dirty little secrets. Whether they are easter eggs, fun behind the scenes facts, cameos or mysteries, it's always fun to learn something new about the game you play. There is no shortage of secrets to be uncovered in Destiny. Dis-tiny list (I am a pun god) contains only a few of Destiny's best kept and most juicy secrets that Bungie may or not want to clue us in on, but there are many more than just this list. What happened to Master Rahool? Where actually is the Last City? Where have I heard Xur's voice before? All these questions and more will be revealed.
15 Easter Egg. No Bunny.
Easter eggs are always cool and always a welcome sight to those who appreciate detail. Now, I can appreciate easter eggs that are shout outs or homages to previous games from the developer, the types of which we see a lot in Overwatch or Fallout, but it's especially exciting to see easter eggs that you do not realize are easter eggs at first. One of these appears in Halo 3: ODST on the streets of New Mombasa. On this map, players can spot a poster that depicts Earth with a white orb orbiting it with the words "Destiny awaits" on it. Now it is understandable that someone just seeing that at the time of the games release would think nothing of it. It isn't until later that we realized that the white orb is The Traveler and that "Destiny awaits" literally means "Get your pre-orders in, fam!"
14 Never Forget Where You Came From
Bungie acquired most of their clout for creating the Halo franchise with Microsoft. The two parted ways, due to wanting different things, so Bungie made Halo: Reach as a parting gift and then set their eyes to their new project, Destiny. Bungie paired up with Activision to create Destiny, but they stayed humble and remembered their roots. They pay their respects to their past game by easter egging it in Destiny. In the Mars strike, Cerberus Vae III, as you pass through Meridian Bay, you come across an open field where you have to fight a Goliath land tank. Right before the field, there is a tower... you know the one I mean? Well, at a certain angle, the tower strikes a remarkable resemblance to Master Chief's spartan helmet.
13 Ain't No Stopping This Hype Train
Destiny was insanely hyped. A giant scale space exploration first person shooter seemed to touch on the desires of whole bunch of gamers. Whether you got Destiny because it was the next big FPS or because of the RPG elements it offered, or the fantastical world of space, it had something for everyone. This wide range of appeal may very well account for the impressive numbers Destiny put up in alpha and beta testing. 6.4 million games of Crucible were played on the PlayStation consoles alone. Numbers increased even more in open beta when over 4.6 million players logged on to create 6.5 million different characters over all platforms. Three months later, by December, Destiny had a player base of 13 million.
12 The Fate Of All Fools
Good guy Bungie is at it again. It's so great when a game company gives back to their loyal fans and this story is a heart warmer indeed. When Bungie heard, via reddit user Bkbunny87, that Destiny became a doctor recommended therapeutic treatment for her husband, who underwent brain surgery, they went above and beyond to do their part in helping with his recovery. Deej, the community manager at Bungie immediately contacted the couple and sent the fan, the exotic scout rifle, The Fate of All Fools. At the time, that was the only issuance of the gun in the game. He was gifted a gun that was quite literally one of a kind. Now, of course the gun would be released almost a year later, but what an amazing gift for a fan in need of a pick-me-up!
11 A Game Changer
Destiny was not only a massive hit for Bungie, but for the Playstation 4 as well. On September 9, 2014, Destiny was Sony's most successful software launch as it shattered previously held records for most rapidly purchased game and most played game during the opening week. That same week, Sony saw its highest spike in PS4 console sales since Christmas, nine months prior. I have absolute pride in stating that I totally contributed to that spike in sales. I remember the Destiny release like it was yesterday. I got that Destiny/PS4 bundle with the Glacier White PS4 and it has been my baby ever since. Whether or not Destiny 2 will be able to break that record remains to be seen. Maybe if Bungie added pets in game... just sayin'.
10 I Know That Voice...
Destiny has a voice acting cast full of stars. I could honestly make another list just detailing the voice actors you do not realize are in Destiny and the other works they are in, but I am going to have to trim it down a bit here. Some of the most noteworthy actors in the game are Fred Tatasciore, Nathan Fillion, and Dee Bradley Baker. Tatasciore is known for many voices in the gaming world, such as Soldier: 76 from Overwatch, Captain Lastimosa from Titanfall 2 and of course Xur from Destiny. Fillion, who is known for his roles as the voice of Green Lantern and Captain Reynolds in Firefly, gives his voice to Cayde-6. Lastly, Dee Bradley Baker is known for voicing Klaus on American Dad, the clone troopers in Star Wars: Clone Wars, and everyone's favorite Prison of Elders sugar daddy, Variks, in Destiny.
9 *Types "Google Translate"*
There is something absolutely epic about other languages that make everything sound a whole lot cooler. Atrium Propugnatorum are the words emblazoned on the ground of the tower near where you spawn in the social area. Atrium Propugnatorum is Latin and translates roughly to "Hall of Guardians" or "Court of Champions," an undoubtedly epic title for what I would have sophisticatedly named "Talky Block." Now it begs the question, what will the Latin name of the Destiny 2 social space be? We know it is a farm, but I mean it's kind of hard to make "The Farm" sound epic. I guess we will have to wait and see if it gets added when Destiny 2 is released for console on September 6th.
8 Respect Your Elders
Bungie pays its respects to previous hit game, and source of inspiration, Dark Souls, in Destiny. Many references can be found in the game, like the the emote "Praise the Light", which appears to be a reference to the "Praise the Sun" gesture in Dark Souls. Destiny goes a little more to the point with the reference nuzzled in a perk on the Warlock chest piece Heart of the Praxic Fire, which is called "Praise the Sun". Another reference in an item resides with the Ghost Angel Cloak, who's item description reads, "We are an army of the chosen dead." This is a cleverly disguised nod to Dark Souls, because it references the "chosen [un]dead", who is the main protagonist of the series, but since the Traveler specifically chose guardians to restore with light, thus resurrecting them, it is also a relevant statement for Destiny itself.
7 Criss Cross Applesauce OP???
There are a lot of tactical advantages players can exploit in Destiny, to get the upper hand. Well guess what? Forget dodging, or shadow stepping, Titan bubbling, because your new MLG strat to avoid damage in Destiny is good ol' fashioned sitting. It may seem strange that sitting in the heat of battle has advantages, and granted, this is only useful in certain scenarios, but think of how salty you can make someone by doing this! When battling a warlock who uses Axiom Bolt grenade, all you have to do when the tracking bombs come for you is to sit. Yup, all you do is sit and the bombs just swirl around your body, absolutely flabbergasted as to where you have gone. This is truly the Destiny equivalent of playing peekaboo with a child that simply cannot grasp that even when your eyes are covered, that you are still there...
6 The Lost Last City
The Last City in Destiny refers to the city overlooked by the tower. We are going to ignore the fact that the Last City may no longer be standing as a result of the story from the Destiny 2 beta, but I digress. So consid-- wait, even if the Last City did get destroyed, it was still the last one. Never been good at the math. That aside, there has been a lot of speculation as to the location of it. Community members have speculated it could be in Russia near the Cosmodrome, in Canada, or even Chile. One reddit user, Fuzzoff, ended the debate when they posted claiming they calculated the Last City's coordinates using the sun's position and shadows. They concluded the Last City is Pokhara, Nepal. If this is true, then the picture above would have been inspiration for the tower! What do YOU think?
5 Girl Power
I find it amazing that the creators of Destiny have never seen any Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings movies ever. Now, this is not the secret of which the list speaks, but I just have to assume it's true, because, the wizards in Destiny look nothing like Ron Weasley or Gandalf the Grey. Instead they are this rag-clad monstrosity that dash all hopes of my raid group ever getting to Crota. Now there is more to wizards than just their massive damage output and ear piercing screeches. As it turns out, they have a secret, and that secret is that all wizards are female. This is evidenced by the Grimoire cards that describe the wizards as, "conceal[ing] herself within darkness and fire..." So keep in mind next time that Ir Yût or Omnigul wipes your fireteam, that hitting like a girl, can mean being hit pretty hard.
4 A Fall(en) Vacation
The Echo Chamber strike on Venus carries you deep into the Ishtar Sink into Campus 9. If you have played Destiny in any significant capacity, you have been here. However, there is more to it than meets the eye. When striking, it's always in the best interest of the team to be full steam ahead and charge forward. BUT, if you go to fast in Campus 9, you may miss... the Yoga Vandal. The Yoga Vandal is a nickname some of the community has bestowed upon Pilxis, the Wolf Claw, a Fallen vandal, who sometimes shows up on an off-map waterfall near Campus 9. There are two theories about his presence. The widely accepted community theory is that he was just a faux pas on the development team's side, but MY theory is that among all the bloodshed, Pilxy boy just wanted to unwind and find himself.
3 The Entire Story Scrapped!
You would imagine that years and years of planning goes into making a game. That is not to say Destiny didn't have this preparation, but there was a rather large hiccup in the development process. In Summer 2013, there was a massive creative overhaul and the near entirety of Destiny's story started from square one. It seems amazing they were able to mobilize and finish it in time. This story revamp was necessitated by high-up Bungie staffers being unimpressed with what they saw so far. Some elements of the old story were kept for the story we know today. The character model for the Stranger was originally going to be a sidekick for the warlock Osiris (Trials of Osiris), but the overhaul put an end to that. You would think the revamp would give Destiny some actual depth to the narrative, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
2 Engram Machine Broke
When I decided to make a list of things Bungie does not want us to know, there was one thing that was very salient to me, and I knew I had to spread the truth about it. Master Rahool, yes, the man who turns all you exotic engrams into ether seeds and glimmer is missing in action in Destiny 2. The new cryptarch for Destiny 2 is Tyra Karn of the Iron Temple. The implications of Rahool's unknown whereabouts are interesting. Could this be a plot point? Maybe the Red Legion kidnapped him and need him to decrypt something? Or maybe one (or more) of Bungie's developers got so tired of their engrams turning into garbage that they just removed him from the game. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH RAHOOL, BUNGIE? What do y'all think? Diabolical Cabal plot or salty dev?
1 Celebrity Guardians
Imagine queuing up for a strike in Destiny and hearing the bold voice of Commander Zavala coming through your headset. You think nothing of it first because Zavala always talks as you're traveling through space. Then, he starts to talk over himself. Two Zavalas? WTF Bungie pls glitch? Well, check twice for yourself, because you may be grouped with the commander himself, in your fireteam. Lance Reddick, the voice of Commander Zavala, is noted as being a fan/player of Destiny himself. Reddick, is not the only person of note who is a fan of Destiny. NBA superstar and Olympic gold medalist Paul George also plays the game, and so does WWE wrestler Big Show, who claims to be in the top 1% of light, grimoire score and kill/death ratio. Now THAT'S a guardian!